suerte

(1) Durkheim, Émile. (1897). Suicide. New York: Simon and Schuster. (2) Putnam, Robert. (2000). Bowling Alone: The Collapse and Revival of American Community. New York: Simon and Schuster. The Durkheim piece is on the importance of social contacts (the emotionally closer, the better) upon making life possible (i.e., preventing suicide) at all - a premise for it being "easier," ʻbetter," etc. Durkeim is one of the three cannonical figures of sociology (aside from Marx and Marx); this is one of his paramount texts. The Putnam piece includes several chapters on the importance of civic associations (roughly put, doing things with people or, more specifically, accumulating and investing "social capital." The latter is a phrase you may want to define and use) for the betterment of individuals and society at large. Good luck with your paper. PS - Never forget Arlie Hochschild's work when looking at the economy (exchange) emotional intimacy. Did you know that employers expect their employees to perform emotional labor (always smile no matter what, etc.) but do not pay them for it, resulting in exploitation of the worker in ways that Marx's economist perspective failed to consider? I love Sociology.

Ann Lamott's "Bird by Bird", an excellent book on the soul-sanding process of writing, tells me to applaud this as a good first draft. Like they say about fatherhood but also applies to applying to grad school, 90% of the work is just showing up. Way to go for already having a draft of your SOP in circulation. But why are you assuming James is going to be on probation or in a detention facility in a few years? an analysis of how you arrived at that assumption, (and of the dangers of scholarship that propagates such assumptions [with state-sanctioned credentials] to perpetuate symbolic domination) would be an interesting place to begin a second draft. They say science is bending over backwards to prove yourself wrong. Try to identify the assumptions implicit in each line of this essay, and attack those. Without having too large of an existential moment, turn the mirror on the theories of deviance you have learned - what are their flaws? how can you not simply employ said theories, but reframe our understanding of the issue that the theories are only attempting to enunciate? The last paragraph sounds like an advertisement for the college you want to go to. Donʻt be a sycophant; trust me, it has failed me 3 application cycles in a row (i did get in somewhere and got my MA, but it was from an intellectual siberia of a program relative to my interests in political sociology). And the last sentence should be the first for the next draft. They need to know who you want to work with, and why, very early on in the essay. One might even dedicate 80-85% of the essay on how the research of specific faculty members jives nicely with your proposed intellectual goals. Keep up the diligent work. You inspire me to get my next draft out pronto (ie, revise last yearʻs essay, without completely discarding everything in frustration for not getting in anywhere last year...itʻs the perseverance card that I am banking on for this year).

here we go again, another year. i chose not to apply to law school. (okay, i am applying to two low-ranking law schools for backup if my expensive Ph.D. pursuits fail to cash in for me...again. granted this is sociology i am applying for, so i use the word "cash" lightly. still would rather study it, love it, and be jobless than a lawyer who trades her youth for billable hours...but that is another post). strategy: - GET BETTER GRE SCORES (how is the new GRE test format, I wonder? i read that the math may be harder...shucks) - SEND LETTERS OF INTEREST BY 8/15 with CV on fancy paper (~35) - BUILD WEBSITE (already have domain name and hosting; site is up and running, just needs me to dump my lifeʻs work in sociology into it and arrange it with a semblance of order. lest possible faculty mentors shudder and click away...) - Contact letter writers by 8/15...preliminarily. Send them draft SOP by 9/1. - Send out transcripts by 9/1 (expensive!!). Some schools want 2 official ones from each school, others only accept scans. - Call secretaries re: fee waivers, application deadlines, when review begins, and fellowship forms by 8/10 - Revise papers I want to submit for sample (question: NSF proposal or something else? honors thesis from 4 years ago?) - Print out and line-edit last years personal history statement - Re-write SOP's (use what I already wrote about wanting to work with faculty; revamp intro and conclusion using little blurbs I have written in my notebook about my passion for the discipline). - And decide how to narrow down my proposed field of study? So difficult.... schools applying for: (or, the 'God hates cowards listʻ) Northwestern, UNC-Chapel Hill, U Penn, Penn State, University of Chicago, Wisconsin, Berkeley, Stanford, Princeton (pending availability of fee waivers for some. like my uncle, bless his soul, told me last year, ʻGod hates cowardsʻ) about me: - BA in Sociology at a school with a top 3-ranking Soc. Ph.D. program in 2007 w/ High Honors & departmental award - MA in Anthropology at a low-ranking school where I wrote a great NSF proposal and further developed my Ph.D. goals (and learned cool words like ideographic and nomothetical, and a semblance of understanding to accurately use them when portraying my intellectual biography to others. I can also describe my cool Ph.D. goals in 10 words or less to mere non-academic mortals!) - 2 co-authored publications, but not in sociology - Undergrad GPA: 3.78 (3.86 only including the last 3 years; higher for soc-only courses; two A+'s, one in a soc. theory and one in a soc. methods course). - Grad GPA: 3.76 - GPA at community college I attended full-time for 2 years while concurrently enrolled in high school: 3.84 - 7 years Research Assistant experience, relevant to my Ph.D. goals - 3 strong letter writers/mentors (people I appreciated working for whom I learned a lot from) - I composed a well-written personal history statement last year - I also wrote a statement of purpose that does explicate why i want to work with specific faculty members, for last year. - Speak 4 languages weaknesses from last year's application - GRE of 1230 (or 1240) (terrible! i get soooo much higher on the practice tests; I just get nervous without a watch on my wrist to look at) - did not contact faculty i wanted to work wit until january or early february (shameful repercussions of being an over-worked procrastinator) - need to have more clearly defined Ph.D. goals Here's to not wasting my money entirely again this year!!

It reminds me of dating! (ha ha jk) Seriously though, I'd say it depends. I satiated my need to know by calling one of the programs and asking whether "all applicants who have been admitted have been contacted." This was at U Mich. The graduate coordinator politely said yes. I wouldn't do it at the place i really, really want to go, for fear of upsetting the ever-so-underestimated staff. Unless March at least.

right?

Given the paucity of acceptances or rejections from them, I am trying to have an cautiously optimistic take on my application status with them. U Penn would be a great school to go to, and I'd be grateful for the opportunity to be challenged by their faculty there. (sending good thoughts towards those in the same boat. this is my last chance for admission this year)

sorry to hear. as for the character-building bit, you are right on with that attitude. =)

Masculine Domination (1998, Stanford University Press) captures Bourdieuʻs notion of symbolic violence (1) succinctly and (2) in a specific context (gender inequality) that can be applied to other forms of power/powerlessness. It would be a good book to warm up to Distinction with, although Invitation to a Reflexive Sociology is the one profs recommend you read to do just that. The latter text has a great appendix on ʻhow to read Bourdieuʻ or something. After you digest Marx: Selected Writings, The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism (Weber), and The Division of Labor in Society (Durkheim), which I am sure was terribly uplifting for us to read the first time around, so many non-sociological texts take on a whole new richness. If I get in somewhere, I will find the syllabus of the soc. theory course I plan to take at where I (theoretically) get in at, and pick one text that sounds cool. Actually, it'd prolly be prudent to pick them up used on amazon and go through them all in a leisurely, non-committal way. It would help one to get their bearings for the Fall, and stay on track with how your department wants to shape your graduate-level introduction to the discipline. Or you can just read a bunch of Wacquantʻs work. That would be greatly recommended; for one thing his writing style and the rigor of his research is good to learn from.

just to be clear - when you say you would apply next fall, do you mean you will submit your applications in December 2011? It would be a leap of faith perhaps, and I am sure there are counter-arguments against this that I have not considered, but I would lean towards option 3. It shows you are committed to going somewhere more rigorous. Perhaps you can see if you can line up a cool work/volunteer opportunity to put on your CV before deciding. I assume you finish up your MS in the middle of this year (may/june?). That would leave you wide open, work aside, to focus whole-heartedly on applying to other programs. Of course - make sure to "look before you leap" if you go that route: Are your GRE scores near 1300 or above? Do you have a well-articulated sociology PhD research agenda? How was the strength of your undergrad program? Do you have good research experience in sociology? Are your grades good/competitive? Are your recommendation letters strong, and can you 100% trust that they have no negative stuff in them? etc. etc. Admission to top-20 soc. PhD programs is elephantitically difficult thesse days. You will want to be logically (and not just sentimentally - as is my weakness) certain - as much as possible - that moving on after your master's. and applying to better-fit programs is something that has a chance of working out. If you do, be sure to apply to comparable-ranking programs where perhaps there are faculty who match your interests better. If you can't answer questions like the above with a 85-90% confidence, option 1 or 2 you mention may be better after all.

Got my official rejection from Michigan today. Yay!

Saw that Cal sent out their rejection notes today. Sending good thoughts towards those who are terribly disappointed by that. Godspeed.

it just makes me feel so...liminal.

I am still hopeful. Itʻs not over till itʻs over (or itʻs March). =)

The four-field program was a noble effort. Post-modernists have placed even that into an existential crisis. =) (Caveat: I know Cal does not have an orthodox four-field anthro program; the comment still holds though).

Hi NB - best of luck in getting into the other Anthro programs! =)